Latest News and Comment from Education

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Shuttered School Sued for $37,000 Printer - voiceofsandiego.org: Schooled: The Education Blog

Shuttered School Sued for $37,000 Printer - voiceofsandiego.org: Schooled: The Education Blog
29Dec
Shuttered School Sued for $37,000 Printer

A shuttered charter school and its former principal are being sued by an Illinois financial company for allegedly failing to pay more than $37,000 they owe for a digital printer and copier.

Theory Into Practice Academy was shut down two years ago after an Encinitas Union School District investigation concluded that the school's board and administration violated conflict of interest laws and mismanaged its finances. While charter schools are independently run, they are publicly funded and usually overseen by school districts, which can close them if they violate the law, don't manage their money properly or fall far short academically.

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29Dec
Thousands of Parents Haven’t Paid Up for Busing

If you're a San Diego parent who puts your kid on a bus to school, you probably know that San Diego Unified started charging some families more than $300 annually for busing this year.

Then again, maybe you don't know that.

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28Dec
More on School Pension Worries

There's an interesting article today in the U-T about public educator pensions and how their costs statewide could echo city pension problems. Here were its key findings:

The state teacher's pension system faces a $40.5 billion shortfall over the next 34 years, in part because it owes payments for life to people such as Rudy Castruita, the retired superintendent of the San Diego County Office of Education.

Castruita receives the region's top educator pension of $281,034 a year, or 107 percent of his final salary. ...

The average retired educator in San Diego County is paid $40,633 per year, or 58 percent of final salary. That's more than the average general city worker at $37,442 but less than the $67,428 for firefighters or the $62,098 for police officers.

About 5 percent of educators receive pensions that pay them 100 percent or more of their final salary.

Some 254 receive pensions of $100,000 or more, or 1.7 percent of the retirees. That compares to 3.4 percent of city retirees.
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More Wrap-Ups Of Top Education News Of The Year | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

More Wrap-Ups Of Top Education News Of The Year | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

More Wrap-Ups Of Top Education News Of The Year

Here are two other lists people I respect have made of the top education news of the year, and I’m adding them to others at The Best (& Worst) Education News In 2010:

The 7 Fascinating Education Ideas of the Year is by Emily Alpert at Voice Of San Diego

AM News: Only Del Valle & Davis Support Elected Board - District 299: Chicago Public Schools Blog

AM News: Only Del Valle & Davis Support Elected Board - District 299: Chicago Public Schools Blog

AM News: Only Del Valle & Davis Support Elected Board

News2

Mayoral candidates split on elected Chicago school board idea Clout Street: Three candidates (Emanuel, CMB, Chico] each said they are opposed to the idea and argued it could further politicize public education in Chicago...District's financial records sought Tribune: Prosecutors seek financial records from West Harvey-Dixmoor district, 4 years after state audit forced repayments. Prosecutors are seeking information from West Harvey-Dixmoor district, four years after a state audit forced repayments of misspent money... Battleground: Illinois EdWeek: Lawmakers are likely to seek a lot of changes to the proposal, said Eddy, who says he wants unions involved in that process. But he acknowledges that the piece of the measure that would change rules on strikes is likely to cause the biggest furor. While the lawmaker said he hasn't committed to the proposal's language on that topic, he also says unions' current powers to strike in Illinois are overly broad... Census could fuel case for new Latino Congressional district: A U.S. Census estimate for 2009 suggests the number of Latinos in the state grew by almost 440,000 over the last decade. Census figures coming out early next year are expected to show those residents concentrated in the Chicago area.

Agitated Education Aggregator Daily

Agitated Education Aggregator Daily
Agitated Education Aggregator Daily
nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com - Is the mayor guilty of a double standard, as he defends the performance of the sanitation workers and fire department, whose ability to fulfill their duties were hampered by the blizzard, and yet h...

leoniehaimson



huffingtonpost.com - "We don't use poverty as an excuse for low achievement." -- Springfield, Ill. School District 186 Superintendent Walter Milton, Jr.2010 wasn't a very good year for public education -- or public any...

Larryferlazzo
indianexpress.com - For those aspiring to enter the teaching profession even at the elementary level, the rules are set to get tougher. The Centre has given its nod to new recruitment rules that will require an aspira...

schoolteaching




bigeducationape.blogspot.com - Expect lots of announcements in the coming weeks from newly elected governors naming their handpicked education secretaries, usually described as impassioned champions of "reform" (meaning the poli...

coopmike48



thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com - These past few weeks have brought a combination of really good news and a moderately stressful lack of news. First, I was accepted to the University of Colorado Boulder’s engineering department, al...

DailyABCs

Missing students located under pile of state-mandated testing manuals | theteachingwhore

Missing students located under pile of state-mandated testing manuals | theteachingwhore

Missing students located under pile of state-mandated testing manuals

San Sebastian, NEW MEXICO (TWP)

Three missing San Sebastian Middle School students were located after hours of being reported missing by their English teacher Lynn Singleterry. Singleterry, who had been cleaning out a four-drawer filing cabinet full of directives and manuals from the principal, superintendent, and state education department, said they disappeared sometime during second hour.

Local authorities were contacted at the end of 3rd hour, but a thorough sweep of the school revealed nothing but Billy Roth smoking one of his dad’s cigarettes in the juniper bush by the back door, ten-thousand pieces of gum (2 still in wrapper), and the school secretary hiding from the principal in the custodian’s closet.

Sgt. Dave Langston said, “We figure they probably ran away to avoid taking these tests that are starting up. I know my own son stayed home a few days last year around this time with what he said was a yeast infection.”

Eventually, the children were found when Singleterry’s 7th hour class noticed movement in the pile of test

This Week In Education: AM News: Textbook Error Mess In Virginia

This Week In Education: AM News: Textbook Error Mess In Virginia

AM News: Textbook Error Mess In Virginia

News2Shanghai Schools’ Approach Pushes Students to Top of Tests NYT: Discipline helps explain why the city’s students outperformed those from about 65 other countries... Error-filled textbooks prompt Va. to call for revamped approval process Washington Post: Reports of extensive errors in Virginia social studies textbooks prompted state education officials on Wednesday to propose revamping the approval process to prevent the issuing of flawed textbooks... Change You Can Invest In: Social Entrepreneurship NPR: Small nonprofit groups headed by social entrepreneurs are tackling some of the world's biggest problems. Spurred by a spirit of innovation, the sector has grown to new heights. And both colleges and investors are noticing... Student Wins $1 In Free Speech Facebook Case MSN: The Pembroke Pines Charter High School grad is celebrating the end of a two-year battle over her first amendment rights that started when she declared her AP English teacher, Sarah Phelps, "the worst she ever had" on her Facebook page... Vt. teacher's license lifted for file destruction Boston Globe: A Vermont middle school teacher has had his license suspended for 10 days for intentionally destroying the special education file of a student from St. Albans.

State education board calls for investigation of charter conversion controversy involving Parent Revolution The Argonaut: Top Stories

The Argonaut: Top Stories

State education board calls for investigation of charter conversion controversy involving Parent Revolution

The California Board of Education has asked the state attorney general to investigate accusations of improper conduct during a proposed conversion to a charter school in Compton where members of the Parent Revolution, an organization that has actively pursued establishing a charter middle school in the Venice /Mar Vista area are involed.

The allegations stem from a recent attempt by the Parent Revolution to institute one of the first uses of the “parent trigger,” a new, somewhat controversial law that allows a majority of parents at a particular school to take over an institution or seek a conversion to a charter.

On Dec. 7, the parent organization, which is led by Ben Austin, its executive director and a former Green Dot Independent Charter board member, teamed up with a group of Compton parents to become the first school to employ the new state law that allows a

YOUR VIEW: Teachers union president has deserted membership | SouthCoastToday.com

YOUR VIEW: Teachers union president has deserted membership | SouthCoastToday.com

YOUR VIEW: Teachers union president has deserted membership

The first thing a union leader must remember is to protect members from injustice. It is, apparently, the first thing Paul Toner, president of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, forgot.

At flashpoint is Toner's position — the rank and file have not voted on it — that using test scores from the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System is a legitimate measure of a classroom teacher's competency.

Diane Ravitch, a former proponent of high-stakes testing and an assistant secretary of education under George H. W. Bush, speaks to this highly volatile and controversial position in her recent book, "The Death and Life of the Great American School System."

"The problem (is) the misuse of testing for high-stakes purposes, the belief that tests could identify ... which students should be held back, which teachers ... should fired or rewarded, and which schools should be closed — and the idea that these changes would inevitably produce better education," wrote Ravitch. She goes on to say, "... testing (is) not the problem. If testing inspires a degree of loathing, it is because it has become the crucial hinge on which turns the fate of students and the reputations and futures of their teachers."

One of the problems with using the MCAS as a measuring stick of teacher effectiveness is that MCAS, in the opinion of many critics throughout the commonwealth, is a flawed instrument. A list of its debits is long and

Amherst Bulletin | Group seeks to challenge charter school funding

Amherst Bulletin | Group seeks to challenge charter school funding

Group seeks to challenge charter school funding

By BEN STORROW Staff Writer

Published on December 31, 2010

A group of Amherst-area officials and residents have launched an effort to ask the state to reconsider the manner in which charter schools are funded, in an attempt to limit the money towns lose when student choose to attend those institutions.

The organizers of the campaign intend to write a warrant article that would be considered by the Town Meetings in Amherst, Leverett, Pelham and Shutesbury, requesting that the state rework the funding formula for charter schools, which are independent public schools that operate under five-year agreements granted by the state's Board of Education.

"My goal is to start a public conversation about charter schools," said Richard Seelig, a Pelham resident, who organized a public meeting last month with Leverett Finance Committee member Nancy Grossman to discuss the subject. "I am